Crater Lake
We arrived somewhere in the Umpqua National Forest last night around 9. We drove up to a campsite near Diamond Lake in the dark, and set up camp in less than 4 minutes. We sat and cooked Ramen and told stories until it was time for bed. In the midst of the Cascades, we knew it was going to be a cold was. My oh my was it cold. At some point in the night, Ray woke me up to inform me that he had no blanket or sleeping bag at all. I had managed to take all of his bedding from him in my sleep. We managed to get some sleep, and wake up at 9 am.
This is our camp:
Quite cozy.
Anyways, so as we were starting to pack up this morning, a young man came by our site. I thought he was going to collect the $5 we owed for staying at the campground, but instead, he asked if we had any jumper cables.
While Ray went and jumped their car, I tore down camp. When the tent was down, and sleeping bags were rolled up and packed, I went over to their site. We hung out and talked with the two for just about an hour. They were great people. Father and son, David and Cannon.
It’s nice to meet good people. They are everywhere, really. We had just been talking about generosity the night before, and it felt good to help these two out. They were really great company, for the short time we had with them.
After we left that campground, we drove only about 10 more minutes to Diamond Lake. It was gorgeous.
We sat by the lake, cooked some Ramen (the food of choice for this low-budget journey), and gawked at how peaceful it was. The lake was calm and glassy, and there were a couple of boats on it.
“I love waterfowl,” was Ray’s words of wisdom for the morning.
The Ramen was delicious. It’s always delicious, but on this crisp morning, it was on time.
His face doesn’t show it, but he’s enjoying it
Onwards we drove, towards Crater Lake. Entering Crater Lake National Park, the mountains around us looked just like Yellowstone. Vast, green, and pristine. We climbed up the hill, as I read the reading materials that we had gotten at the entrance aloud.
…formed by an eruption 7,700 years ago…the mountain collapsed in on itself because it couldn’t support it’s weight…caldera…deepest lake in the country, at 1,195 feet deep….
We were getting excited. As we were climbing up the hill, there was a pull off on the left. Ray was glancing over at the mountains to the left, just as I saw a glimpse of blue on the right.
“You should probably pull over there,” I said.
“Oh!”
We pulled over, and this was what we saw:
It was extremely difficult to contain my excitement. A terribly goofy smile would not leave my face alone, no matter how hard I tried.
“Is this the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen?” I asked.
“It’s up there,” he replied, as we stared slack-jawed at the crater below.
This is heaven, I kept thinking. The mountains looked like mountains in the sky, reflected perfectly by the blue lake. It was simply incredible.
We spent a good hour or maybe more at the edge of the caldera, looking down at the lake, before moving on.
Today we are driving to the Redwoods, on the Northwestern coast of California. We probably won’t get there until dark, but we are getting comfortably used to arriving in the dark and waking up to a surprisingly beautiful sight in the morning.
